A Power Not So Great?

[stevehope]

After several games, I'm beginning to wonder if the Elven strongholds aren't too vulnerable. Lorien is usually the first FP stronghold to fall, and Rivendell has fallen about half the time as well. Even the Grey Havens was conquered in one game.

Part of the problem seems to be that there just aren't that many Elven units, so as a game goes longer (which it probably does with beginning players), the ability of the Elves to reinforce is pretty low? I'm not sure, but relative to the number of units they have to defend them the Elves have a LOT of VPs to defend (4 strongholds defended by 15 units, versus Rohan or Gondor able to recruit 18 and 20 units respectively to defend their 3 and 5 VPs--as many in total as the Elves have alone).

The games we've played have been quite close, so I'm reluctant to make any dramatic changes to give advantage to the FP in this regard, but I'm wondering if starting the game with "A Power Too Great" in play or something like that would be a reasonable compromise--it DOES seem too easy for the Shadow to fall over Lorien and Rivendell in the game, given that Tolkien seemed to think that those two places would be two of the last holdouts against the might of Sauron.

[nigel]

stevehope said:

it DOES seem too easy for the Shadow to fall over Lorien and Rivendell in the game, given that Tolkien seemed to think that those two places would be two of the last holdouts against the might of Sauron.

The reason for this in the book is the power of Nenya and Vilya (the Elven Rings), Grey Havens didn't have Narya as Cirdan had given it to Gandalf. If Sauron got the One back, then the Elves would be left bare and defenseless to him. But in the game the Elven Rings are used for the 'change a die' mechanic instead of a 'defend' Lorien/Rivendell mechanic.

So how about this as a variant of your variant?

At any point during the Free People's turn you can discard an action die and 'use' 2 elven rings (give them to your opponent) to search the deck for the event "A Power Too Great" and put it into play


This then represents the power of the 2 Elven rings defending the Elvish strongholds.

Means the Shadow Player has to plan on the Power To Great making an appearance when/if a move is made against Lorien as long as there are at least 2 Elven rings unused on the FP side. Of course the Shadow Player can burn an action die and 2 cards to discard the event ...

Nigel

[stevehope]

2 rings is a lot--if I'm Sauron, I wouldn't be particularly deterred by trading action dice and swapping cards for rings. I wonder if you could just allow the FP to use a WotW to put "A Power Too Great" into play, whether searching through the deck or the discard pile to do it.

There are other fixes I could consider, like just moving a Sauron elite from Dol Guldur to Minas Morgul (or Morannon, whichever doesn't start with one) at the start of the game. That step alone would have some significant impact. Or maybe the first muster dice of the FP should just be used on the Elves...It's too early to be sure.

After a dozen more games or so, hopefully I'll know if it's something I really want to change! Thanks for your suggestion, Nigel!

[nigel]

stevehope said:

2 rings is a lot--if I'm Sauron, I wouldn't be particularly deterred by trading action dice and swapping cards for rings. I wonder if you could just allow the FP to use a WotW to put "A Power Too Great" into play, whether searching through the deck or the discard pile to do it.

There are other fixes I could consider, like just moving a Sauron elite from Dol Guldur to Minas Morgul (or Morannon, whichever doesn't start with one) at the start of the game. That step alone would have some significant impact. Or maybe the first muster dice of the FP should just be used on the Elves...It's too early to be sure.

After a dozen more games or so, hopefully I'll know if it's something I really want to change! Thanks for your suggestion, Nigel!

Well a Power to Great is a good card - plus you're getting it without having to draw it, and playing it for the cost of any action die, if the cost is too high, make it just 1 Elven Ring. I'm not so sure about getting it from the discard though

Possibly the rule could be:

During the Free People's turn you can discard an action die and 'use' an elven ring (give it to your opponent) to search the deck or discard for the event "A Power Too Great" and put it into your hand


That way you can get it back after it's been discarded, but you have to burn an elven ring and 2 action dice to get it back into play. But this might be too powerful.

Saying all that, I think you need to consider options as the FP player. If you know you're opponent is going to go all out to take Lorien early, what can you do?

One obvious thing is get Gandalf the White over to Lorien ASAP. So move the fellowship like mad on turn one, use Gandalf to absorb the damage - then drop him into play. Of course this won't work if your opponent doesn't bring in a minion. Even getting a few companions out of the fellowship and in Lorien might be enough to discourage an attack, if you have useful combat cards.

Alternatively give him something else to worry about/concentrate on - get Rohan close to war, get a companion to activate them and threaten Orthanc.

Finally is Lorien going down that big a deal? It's only 2 points towards the Shadow's victory - sure it's a pain as Lorien is the obvious Fellowship healing spot - but by-pass it and visit Rohan or Gondor before the push into Mordor, if the Fellowship needs healing.

Nigel

[nigel]

Another tactic to consider is let your opponent burn Lorien, it will (hopefully) bring the Elves into the war. Then recruit Elves in Rivendell and go threaten Moria, I'd swap Lorien for Moria as the FP ... if the army that took Lorien goes to defend Moria you can take back Lorien & threaten Dol Guldur. Even if all this fails the action dice your opponent has spent goofing around in the middle of the map (for just 2 VPs) has diverted him from taking Gondor (5 Vps) and/or Rohan (3 VPs) or pushing on Dale/Erebor/Woodland Realm (5 VPs).

As the FP you're doing amazingly well if you end up with a result as in the book - where the only defeats were Osgiliath and the Fords .... all the other battles were victories for the FP! Minas Tirith held, Helm's Deep held, Saruman went down to the Ents. Etc.

If every game went similar to the book, who'd want to play Sauron??

Nigel

[stevehope]

Lorien falling isn't that big a deal--it's just a little disappointing from a flavor/"historical" standpoint that arguably the toughest nut to crack in all of Middle Earth is often the first place to fall under the shadow. Plus of course the fact that the Fellowship is unable to stop in Lorien most games.

But no, it's not that big a deal in and of itself...The bigger worry per my first post is that it could be that b/c of the small Elven force pool and the 8 VPs that the Elves control that the best Sauron strategy is just to go straight for the Elven strongholds.

But we'll see...You're probably right that simply using a die (albeit a very rare die that doesn't come up much) isn't enough. But I'd think that WotW plus discarding an event card would be enough. I still think using a ring for it would be too much, but I could be wrong and I do like the flavor of that.

I'm not going to make any changes to our rules for quite a while, though. The game is pretty tight as is and I want to see if our results change as we get more familiar with things.

[nigel]

Sure,

I'm not planning on using any of the variants I've suggested in many games as yet - still happy to play the game out of the box

And I'm certainly not an 'expert' yet - still experiementing with the strategies for each side.

I like the way the 4 player game is so different to the 2 player, you can't use the same strategies in both as it's much harder to 'concentrate' on a particular army etc.

My only comment with the 4 player is I suspect the easiest target for the Shadow/Saruman is Rohan as both can quite easily get there and being hit from 2 fronts pretty much spells doom for the riders.

Nigel